Endoscopy Every Three Years Cuts Gastric Cancer Death Risk: Cohort Study
Written By : Medha Baranwal
Medically Reviewed By : Dr. Kamal Kant Kohli
Published On 2025-08-27 15:00 GMT | Update On 2025-08-27 15:00 GMT
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South Korea: The question of how often screening endoscopy should be performed to effectively reduce gastric cancer (GC) deaths has remained uncertain. A new large-scale Korean cohort study, published in Gastrointestinal Endoscopy, offers clarity, suggesting that undergoing endoscopic screening every three years or sooner is associated with a markedly lower risk of dying from gastric cancer.
Researchers utilized data from the Korean National Health Insurance claims registry to evaluate all patients newly diagnosed with gastric cancer in 2010. A total of 26,199 individuals were included in the analysis. To understand the effect of prior screening, patients were grouped based on the time interval between their most recent screening endoscopy and their diagnostic procedure for gastric cancer. The intervals assessed were ≤1 year, ≤2 years, ≤3 years, ≤4 years, ≤5 years, >5 years, and a never-screened group.
The findings revealed a clear survival benefit among those who underwent screening compared with individuals who had never been screened. Specifically, the study reported:
- Undergoing screening endoscopy within one to three years before diagnosis significantly reduced gastric cancer mortality, with hazard ratios of 0.47 for ≤1 year, 0.34 for ≤2 years, and 0.35 for ≤3 years compared with never-screened individuals.
- Patients screened within three years had a 28–29% lower risk of gastric cancer–specific death than those whose last screening was more than three years prior.
- After propensity score matching, the survival benefit remained consistent, with an adjusted hazard ratio of 0.71 (95% CI, 0.62–0.80) for the ≤3-year group.
- The benefit of screening diminished with longer intervals, as patients screened more than five years before diagnosis had outcomes similar to the never-screened group.
- Screening was well tolerated, with no additional safety concerns reported among screened individuals.
- A three-year screening interval appears optimal, balancing effectiveness and practicality, especially in high-risk regions.
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